#FreeHerFace campaign gathers force as high-profile men rebel against crackdown on face coverings in Afghanistan
Male TV presenters in Afghanistan are wearing face masks on screen to show solidarity after the Taliban issued an order that all women on news channels must cover their faces.
In a protest dubbed #FreeHerFace on social media, men on Tolo News wore masks to mimic the effect of the face veil their female colleagues have been forced to wear after a Taliban crackdown.
Continue reading...Fawzia Amini advocates for rights of Afghan women and girls from London hotel room she’s been stuck in for nine months
One of Afghanistan’s top female judges has been honoured with an international human rights award while she continues her work to advocate for her country’s women and girls from a London hotel.
Fawzia Amini, 48, fled Afghanistan last summer after the Taliban takeover of the country. She had been one of Afghanistan’s leading female judges, former head of the legal department at the Ministry of Women, senior judge in the supreme court, and head of the violence against women court.
Continue reading...Sir Philip Barton castigated along with Dominic Raab in damning report by MPs into UK’s chaotic exit
The senior civil servant in charge of the Foreign Office should consider his position after presiding over a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan that betrayed UK allies, put lives in danger, showed a total absence of planning and was chaotically managed, MPs have concluded in a damning report.
The report from the foreign affairs select committee said the absence of leadership – both ministerial and official, including the permanent secretary, Sir Philip Barton – when Kabul fell was inexcusable and a grave indictment on those supposedly in charge. It added that Barton failed to give candid evidence to the committee, and says as a result it had lost confidence in him. The committee also accused him of covering up political interference in the fast-tracking of some individuals out of Afghanistan.
Continue reading...Move is part of hardline pivot after militants hinted at more moderate restrictions when taking power last year
Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have begun enforcing an order requiring all female TV news presenters in the country to cover their faces while on air, as part of a hardline shift that has drawn condemnation from rights activists.
After the order was announced on Thursday, only a handful of news outlets complied. However, on Sunday most female presenters were seen with their faces covered after the Taliban’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice began enforcing the decree.
Continue reading...Female anchors post pictures of themselves being ‘erased’ on orders of virtue and vice ministry
Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers have ordered all female TV presenters to cover their faces on air, the country’s biggest media outlet has said.
The order came in a statement from the Taliban’s virtue and vice ministry, tasked with enforcing the group’s rulings, as well as from the information and culture ministry, the Tolo news channel tweeted on Thursday. The statement called the order “final and non-negotiable”, the channel said.
Continue reading...Report by special inspector general blames Trump and Biden administrations, as well as the Afghan government of Ashraf Ghani
Afghan armed forces collapsed last year because they had been made dependent on US support that was abruptly withdrawn in the face of a Taliban offensive, according to a scathing assessment by a US government watchdog.
A report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar) on the catastrophic defeat that led to the fall of Kabul on 15 August, blamed the administrations of Donald Trump and Joe Biden as well as the Afghan government of Ashraf Ghani.
Continue reading...High court to hear claims that judges ‘in a very precarious position’ hiding from Taliban have faced long delays
Alleged inconsistencies in the way the UK Home Office and Foreign Office process asylum applications from vulnerable judges in hiding in Afghanistan are being challenged at the high court on Tuesday.
If successful, the three separate judicial reviews will require the Home Office to undertake a wholesale rethink of how it is handling cases. The reviews – anonymised to protect the claimants from persecution by the Taliban – cover a male judge and a female judge who have had their applications for asylum rejected, and a prominent female women’s rights activist.
Continue reading...Four other government departments scrapped as cash-strapped regime faces $500m budget deficit
Taliban authorities in Afghanistan dissolved five key departments of the former US-backed government, including the country’s human rights commission, deeming them unnecessary in the face of a financial crunch, an official said.
Afghanistan faced a budget deficit of 44bn Afghanis ($501m) this financial year, Taliban authorities said as they announced their first annual national budget since taking over last August.
Continue reading...Women say they fear going out in public despite Taliban vow to respect hard-won rights after 2021 takeover
Despite everything that has happened to her country since the Taliban seized power last August, 29-year old Nafisa still never believed there would come a day when she would be unable to feel the sun on her face as she walked the streets of Kabul.
Yet on Saturday, the Taliban’s sinisterly named ministry for the propagation of virtue ordered that Nafisa, along with millions of women across Afghanistan, should ideally not leave the house at all. If they do, they must be fully veiled and never show their faces in public.
Continue reading...Decree forces male relatives to police law by making them liable to fines or prison for breaches
The Taliban have ordered all women to cover their faces in public in Afghanistan, the latest sweeping restriction by a government that has taken away women’s right to travel long distances alone, work outside healthcare or education, and receive a secondary education.
In a cruel twist, the decree makes women’s relatives and employers the enforcers. If their faces are seen in public, their male “guardian” will be fined, then jailed. If the woman who goes out uncovered or her relative work for the government, they must be fired.
Continue reading...Absence of people in tunnel key to Roberts-Smith’s claim in defamation action that alleged war crimes couldn’t have taken place
The soldier who discovered the infamous tunnel in Whiskey 108 says there were no fighting-aged males hiding inside, backing Ben Roberts-Smith’s version of events of a fiercely contested mission in Afghanistan, the federal court has heard.
Roberts-Smith’s fourth soldier witness, a still-serving warrant officer anonymised as Person 29, gave evidence on Wednesday about a 2009 SAS raid on a compound known as Whiskey 108 in the village of Kakarak – an insurgent redoubt in Afghanistan’s southern Uruzgan province.
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Continue reading...Officials say man in hiding who helped prosecute terrorists does not meet relocation criteria, despite high court ruling in his favour
A senior judge who prosecuted terrorists and is now in hiding in Afghanistan feels “heartbroken, abandoned and backstabbed” by the British government for refusing to bring him to safety despite a high court ruling in his favour.
The high-profile judge, whom the Guardian is not naming for his safety, also received strong support from two former independent reviewers of terrorism legislation.
Continue reading...Explosion in Afghan capital is latest in string of attacks on civilians during Ramadan
A powerful explosion has killed more than 50 worshippers after Friday prayers at a Kabul mosque, the latest of a series of attacks on civilian targets in Afghanistan during Ramadan.
The blast hit the Khalifa Sahib mosque in the west of the capital in the early afternoon, according to Besmullah Habib, the deputy spokesperson for the interior ministry.
Continue reading...Two explosions rock boys' school in Kabul as students were coming out of their morning classes
At least six people have been killed and 11 wounded in two bomb blasts at a boys’ school in a Hazara Shia neighbourhood of the Afghan capital, Kabul.
The frequency of bomb blasts in the country has declined significantly since the Taliban ousted the US-backed Afghan government in August last year, but Islamic State has claimed several attacks.
Continue reading...Election statement also calls for a special intake of Ukrainians and a wider reassessment of refugee policies
Australia’s Catholic bishops have called for a special intake of 20,000 refugees from Afghanistan, saying the country has a “moral duty” to do more.
As part of its election statement, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference said the country had an obligation to take more refugees from Afghanistan because of the support shown to Australian military forces.
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Continue reading...Soldier refused to answer questions about one mission on grounds of self-incrimination on offence of ‘the most serious nature’
An SAS soldier who refused to answer questions about an alleged unlawful killing in Afghanistan has told the federal court he felt threatened to testify by the newspapers being sued by Ben Roberts-Smith.
The soldier, anonymised before the court as Person 56, refused to answer questions about a 2012 mission to Fasil, where, it has previously been alleged, he and Roberts-Smith were responsible for the unlawful killing of two Afghan men who had been taken prisoner from a vehicle.
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Continue reading...Second adjournment prolongs agony of Afghans Amir Zahiri and Akif Rasuli, serving 50-year sentences for piloting a migrant boat
MEPs appalled by “shocking” legal proceedings against two Afghans convicted of people smuggling in Greece have vowed to raise the issue with the European parliament.
Lawmakers who had flown into Lesbos for a scheduled appeals court hearing of the asylum seekers on Thursday – the second in three weeks – were outraged when judges again adjourned the case, prolonging the agony of the refugees, who are currently serving 50-year prison terms.
Continue reading...Conference raises only $2.44bn as Russian foreign minister says west is responsible for country’s humanitarian crisis
The world’s donor drought, and growing global divisions over Afghanistan’s political direction, have been laid bare when a UN appeal for $4.4bn (£3.35bn) to help Afghanistan fell massively short, the second UN donor conference in a month to do so.
Donor countries pledged only $2.44bn towards the appeal, a senior UN official said on Thursday after a high-level pledging conference.
Continue reading...Taliban’s increasingly repressive rule could lead to donor backlash at UN pledging conference on Thursday
Western officials fear a UN pledging conference this Thursday aimed at raising more than $4.4bn (£3.34bn) aid for Afghanistan is likely to fall well short of its target. One UN official admitted he feared the Taliban’s increasingly repressive rule would lead to a donor backlash.
The new UN appeal, on top of the flash appeal for $600m in the immediate wake of the Taliban takeover in August, is hoping to raise the biggest sum ever for a single country at a pledging conference.
Continue reading...Briefing to Peter Dutton five days after fall of Kabul reveals department’s concern over Afghan officers who had studied in Australia
The Morrison government fast-tracked visas for 11 Afghan army officers who studied at Australian defence colleges after officials warned Peter Dutton a failure to help them would generate negative news stories, documents reveal.
A briefing to the defence minister, obtained by Guardian Australia under freedom of information laws, said the group was “of high profile and at considerable risk” of Taliban retribution.
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